


the voice of your eyes is deeper than all roses

by galaxyjun



Category: NCT (Band)
Genre: Angst, Hanahaki Disease, M/M, Unrequited Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-21
Updated: 2018-11-21
Packaged: 2019-08-26 21:08:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,115
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16688845
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/galaxyjun/pseuds/galaxyjun
Summary: loving mark is loving mark is loving mark, and somewhere, deep down, donghyuck can’t help but wonder why mark can never feel the same.*title from "somewhere i have never travelled,gladly beyond" by e. e. cummings*there is a plagiarized version of this fic going around under the name of "I’ll always love you (until thorns remain)" ! this is the original version, and that is literally just my fic with the names switched around !!! please don't read it!!!!!





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> wrote this all in one evening i have an assignment due tomorrow Whoops

donghyuck expected the flowers sooner.

it’s been a long time since he fell in love with mark, after all. years of training together, living together, eating together, sleeping together, anything and everything they did, side by side. donghyuck begins where mark ends, and he’s almost unable to imagine an existence without the other.

but still, it takes three years before the flowers bloom. roots digging into his lungs, winding around his windpipe, pushing against his ribcage, morning glories pressed against his tongue. donghyuck spits them up in the middle of the night, the summer air cooling the sweat on his back, and he looks into a toilet bowl of red blood and purple petals and misery and mirth and laughs.

he wouldn’t have it any other way.

donghyuck does the research. hanahaki disease. caused by heartbreak due to unrequited love. forty percent survival rate if symptoms are addressed immediately, thirteen percent in the latest stages. treatment involves extensive therapy, counselling, rehabilitation, and in the most extreme of cases, hypnosis. whatever it takes to stop those feelings. stop the love. stop that heartbreak. 

and donghyuck could go tell a manager. start treatment, be done in a few months. it’s early enough, he’s got loads of time. see a therapist a couple times a week until seeing mark doesn’t make his heart ache and his chest hurt and his flowers grow like weeds. he would, maybe, if it were someone else, if he were somewhere else, if this all happened in another lifetime.

but donghyuck isn’t a thinker. he’s a feeler. maybe a dumb one, but he doesn’t tell a soul. keeps his lips sealed, lets the morning glories fill his mouth with every smile and every laugh and every breath that mark takes and makes. donghyuck takes his heart of glass and presses it into mark’s hands, telling him to keep it safe, knowing only shards will remain in the end.

donghyuck is eighteen years old. donghyuck is a member of nct. donghyuck has a mother, a father, and an older sister. donghyuck has tan skin. donghyuck has seventeen friends that he would never give up for the world. donghyuck has the job of his dreams. donghyuck cried the day he was told he was going to debut. donghyuck craves physical contact. donghyuck feels with every fibre of his being. donghyuck is sharp-tongued and quick-witted. donghyuck likes kimbap. donghyuck is in love with mark lee.

and that can never really change.

he resigns himself, but can’t make peace. for as much as donghyuck is unwilling to give up his feelings, he wants to _live._ there are songs to perform, awards to win, countries to visit and fans to smile for and with every mouthful of petals there’s a growing twinge of anger, sadness, disappointment, grief.

because loving mark comes as easy as breathing. loving mark is pinching cheeks and dodging punches. loving mark is throwing insults in the same breath as compliments. loving mark is breaking down in stairwells for strong arms to pull you in. loving mark is climbing into beds and tangling legs together and falling asleep in moments. loving mark is lying on a practice room floor for hours on end, letting the sweat dry, letting the dreams simmer. 

loving mark is loving mark is loving mark, and somewhere, deep down, donghyuck can’t help but wonder why mark can never feel the same.

but time passes and life goes on and donghyuck masters the art of pressing flowers to the roof of his mouth and tucking them in his cheeks and and flattening them under his tongue. his mouth is a cavern of secrets and all his truths are folded neatly and packed away until he’s ready to spit them out like they burn and god they do. rarely do they come out without their fair share of blood, and donghyuck looks into the mass of bloodied morning glories and hysterically thinks that purple and red are the ugliest things he’s ever seen.

it’s hard to hide, and everyone surely has their suspicions, but they’ve barely had time to breathe these past few months and it’s a blessing. donghyuck normally hates the tired eyes and dragged feet and slurred words but they’re the only thing preventing them from finding out and just once, just this once, he selfishly begs to let this bliss last for as long as possible.

but renjun finds out.

renjun finds out because he’s a light sleeper and donghyuck shut the door too loud. renjun finds out because donghyuck gets careless and doesn’t lock the door. renjun finds out because he’s been waiting for the opportunity to confront donghyuck for a while.

and so he opens to the door to the bathroom and the night begins with donghyuck sitting there, watching renjun’s eyes widen in horror, watching his mouth slacken with shock, watching his limbs go limp with understanding, donghyuck sits there, petals pasted to his lips and sweat plastering his hair to his forehead. and all donghyuck can find within himself is relief that mark’s out of the country on a shoot.

because it’s a full on shit show after that. there’s screaming and shouting, cancellations and appointments, tears and anger and angst and just the ever present question of why why _why._

he gets a phone call from his mother. she’s in tears. mark is home in thirteen days.

they get a diagnosis. he’s got a four percent chance of survival. the manager breaks down in the doctors office. mark is home in ten days.

taeyong holds him on the couch. he’s shaking. begging. crying. donghyuck whispers apologies into his neck. mark is home in four days.

renjun comes into his room. donghyuck’s too tired to do anything but lie down these days, so he’s there most of the time, the rest of the members come in and talk and hold donghyuck’s hand like the tighter they hold it the more likely he is to stay. renjun comes into donghyuck’s room, glaring. “i can’t believe you’re dying over mark lee.” he says, but there’s no humour. no room for it.

donghyuck shrugs. “i mean it is what it is.”

“but it doesn’t have to be.” renjun insists. “donghyuck, i’ve been reading about hanahaki, and you don’t have to die—“

“renjun i don’t have to but i’m going to.” donghyuck sighs. renjun isn’t the first person to try this. won’t be the last.

_“listen.”_ renjun hisses. “it’s not about the other person’s feelings hyuck, it’s more about your own. hanahaki comes from persistent heartbreak, which—“

“you think i don’t know?” donghyuck snaps. he’s so tired. “renjun, i’ve been living with hanahaki for months now. and i know it’s pathetic. mark lee won’t love me back, i broke my heart in the process, and i’ve got a lung full of flowers to show for it, okay?”

renjun slams his hands on the desk by donghyuck’s door. his eyes are full and wet and his lip is shaking. he’s beautiful. donghyuck doesn’t want to let him go. “you’re _not_ pathetic.” he spits, but the venom is lost in the shaking of his voice. “you’re just stuck and i’m trying to help you because i don’t wanna see one of my best friends _die._ ”

his eyes are pleading, begging. but donghyuck just bites his tongue and shakes his head and watches as renjun’s face crumbles and turns and runs. 

mark is home in six hours.

and six hours later finds donghyuck, lying in bed, staring at the ceiling. six hours later, mark is home, bursting through donghyuck’s door.

“you’re dying.” mark says. he’s wearing the clothes in the airport previews. his face is oily and his eyes are tired. he’s got his bags in his hands, knuckles white around the straps.

donghyuck pauses, sitting up. it’s a struggle now, his breathing shortened by the flowers in his lungs, but he manages. “yeah.” he rasps out. “when did you get back from filming?”

mark doesn’t answer. he comes forwards, sits down on donghyuck’s bed, right between his legs. like they’ve always done. “is it me?” he asks, voice shaking just around the edges.

donghyuck sighs, cracking a rueful smile. “who else would it be?”

and silence descends. the lights still off, the room still dark, donghyuck can barely see mark’s expression but he knows it’s twisted, pained, agonized. what else would it be? and the highway sounds in the distance, a million miles away from here, now, this moment, where donghyuck is halfway to death’s door with the boy he loves in front of him, the boy who’s pushed a garden into his body with just a smile and an accent and eyes that sparkle like twilight. and donghyuck lets himself love.

but then there are lips on his. warm, trembling, pushing, insistent, and they keep pushing and pushing and pushing until donghyuck is on his back and mark lee is lying on top of him, hands dug into donghyuck’s shoulders, holding him like a lifeline. 

donghyuck feels the surge of petals and heartbreak and pain, claws and mark’s shoulders, pushes him off and heaves over the side of the bed. “what the fuck?” he gasps, confused and numb and terrified and despairing all at once.

but mark sobs, from his chest, tearing through his throat, rippling through his whole body, and donghyuck stops. “it didn’t _work._ ” he chokes out. “hyuck i’m so sorry i thought it would work—“

“hyung, slow down, please.” everything is too fast, too heavy, slipping between donghyuck’s fingers and he can barely hold on.

“it’s my fault.” mark says, or donghyuck guesses that that’s what mark says, because mark’s face is in his palms and he’s sobbing harder than donghyuck’s ever seen anyone cry. “it’s all my fault, fucking hell—“

“hyung, it isn’t your fault that you don’t love—“

_“but i do love you.”_ mark gasps, and it’s like everything goes still. “you’re the most important person in my life donghyuck, i could never be the person i am without you and i love you with my heart and mind and soul and everything, i love you so much donghyuck but it’s _not the way you need.”_

the air is still, filled only by mark’s full-bodied sobs. “i don’t want to live in a world without my best friend.” mark whispers. “but you’re dying and it’s all my fault for not loving you the way you need and i’m so _sorry.”_

donghyuck feels numb. donghyuck can’t breathe. donghyuck reaches out and cups mark’s face in between his hands, pulling him close, pulling him down. donghyuck holds mark against him, and feels the warmth of mark’s tears seep through his shirt and into his skin. in the corner of his eye, he can see the pile of morning glories.

_he loves me._ donghyuck thinks. without inflection, intonation. thinks them like he reads words on a page. plain and simple, loud and clear. _of course he does, how else could he feel?_

mark is twenty years old. mark is from canada. mark has a mother and a father and an older brother. mark isn’t fluent in korean yet. mark doesn’t know how to make a proper joke. mark rests only when he’s made to. mark has eyes full of galaxies. mark loves donghyuck. 

mark shudders, tightening his grip on donghyuck’s arm. he’s falling asleep, the exhaustion of travel and grief weighing heavy on his shoulders. donghyuck watches as his breathing evens out, his face relaxes, he drifts away. never loosening his grip, not once, not one single bit.

donghyuck watches him sleep, then when he can’t keep his eyelids open any longer, he falls asleep as well.

and when morning comes, donghyuck awakes to mark drooling on his arm. donghyuck awakes to the sun streaming through the windows, splintered by the blinds. donghyuck awakes to the sounds of chatter and cooking and people and home. donghyuck awakes to find a single red daisy on his tongue. and he smiles, bright and wide, breathing in clearly for the first time in a while.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> morning glory - love in vain  
> red daisy - beauty unknown to possessor
> 
> [twitter](http://www.twitter.com/maplemarkle) | [curiouscat](https://curiouscat.me/kyunset)


	2. Chapter 2

if you can, please report https://archiveofourown.org/works/16690153 aka the plagiarized version of my fic. scroll down to the bottom and click "report abuse" and then give your reasoning as "plagiarism". In the description box either say that this is a plagiarized version of a fic by galaxyjun or just include the link https://archiveofourown.org/works/16688845 in the box. it would also be great if you could ask for the ao3 staff to actually do something about this by either banning the user or restricting access to the orphan account. thank you so much, and i'm really sorry to ask this of you.


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